Check 1: the license
Open the Texas Real Estate Commission's license holder search and search the name of the person you are dealing with, then the broker they say sponsors them. You want three things: an active sales agent or broker license in that person's legal name, an active broker company with a designated broker, and the sales agent's record showing that broker as the sponsor. A trade name like FundPlug is not a license holder; a person and a broker are.
For this desk: search license 0705914 and the record reads James Daniel Thorne III, Sales Agent, Active, sponsored by Myers The Home Buyers of Dallas, LLC. Search 9005311 and the record reads Myers The Home Buyers of Dallas, LLC, Broker Company, Active, designated broker Joshua Edward DeShong, license 0558435. Those three records are the whole answer to who runs FundPlug. The About page lists the same searches for this desk, step by step.
A desk with no license can legally sell only contracts it acquired itself (Occupations Code 1101.0045). In the desk's reading, marketing your contract for a fee is a brokerage act for another person, and an unlicensed person cannot sue to collect that fee (section 1101.806(b)). Ask a Texas real estate attorney if a desk tells you otherwise.
Check 2: the agreement
Nothing should be marketed before you sign an agreement that states the services, the term, whether it is exclusive, the fee or split, and who pays it at closing. Texas will not enforce a promise to pay a real estate commission unless it is in writing and signed by the party being charged (section 1101.806(c)), so a licensed desk has every reason to put it in writing, and a desk that will not is telling you something.
Read for three things: a term with an end date, a fee that is a number or a percentage of a defined amount, and language that nothing is netted from your assignment fee without your signature. Exclusivity for 72 hours while the desk works the file is normal. Exclusivity with no end is not.
Check 3: who pays whom
Your assignment fee comes from the buyer at closing and sits on the settlement statement. The desk's share is a separate line, paid to the sponsoring broker, because a sales agent may not take compensation from anyone but the broker and may not pay anyone except through the broker (section 1101.651(b) and (c)). A licensed desk may also not pay an unlicensed person for performing an act of a broker (section 1101.651(a)), so an offer to pay you a referral fee for a lead you do not control, rather than an assignment fee for a contract you hold, is a problem for both of you.
Ask the desk to walk you through the settlement statement on a closed file, with names removed. If it cannot, it has not closed one.
Check 4: the daisy-chain test
Ask one question: do you market contracts you do not hold a JV agreement on, or deals another wholesaler sent you? A desk that says yes will market yours the same way, to forty buyers who then find your seller. A desk that says no should also refuse your file if you are not direct with the seller of record, and should ask for the section 5.0205 disclosures to the owner and to any buyer before it moves. That refusal is the feature.
Check 5: the buyers
Every desk claims fund buyers. Ask which kinds: single-family rental operators, build-to-rent builders, rehabbers, landlords. Then ask the question that matters from January 7, 2027: how many single-family homes do those buyers and their affiliates control? Federal law bars investors at 350 or more homes from buying, or contracting to buy, a single-family home after that date, outside narrow exceptions. A desk that cannot tell you which of its buyers are under the line has not thought about whether its buyers can close.
Questions for the first call
- What is your name, your license number and your sponsoring broker?
- Send me the agreement before you send the file anywhere.
- What is the fee, who pays it, and on which side of the settlement statement does it sit?
- Do you market deals you do not hold under a signed JV agreement?
- Will you contact my seller? (The right answer is never.)
- Who are your buyers, and how many homes do they control?
- What happens to my contract if you cannot find a buyer before my option period ends?
Red flags
Run this desk through the same five checks. The license numbers are on every page, the agreement comes before the file moves, the fee runs through the sponsoring broker, the intake refuses daisy chains, and the desk will tell you which buyers can close. If any of that is not true on the day you call, keep your contract and tell us.
- No person's name anywhere on the site or the call.
- Claims of hedge fund buyers with no names and no way to check.
- Any fee before closing, or a fee for reviewing the file.
- Exclusivity without a term.
- A request for your seller's phone number.
- An offer to add the desk's name to your contract before an agreement is signed.